Refinery Blast In Iran's Persian Gulf Port Kills One

One person has died and four others were injured in an incident at Iran's southern refinery of Bandar Abbas last week, Iranian state media reported on Monday.

The Iranian Oil Ministry's Shana news agency said the incident occurred late on September 22 during emergency repairs, adding that five maintenance workers were hurt, with one worker succumbing to his injuries later.

"During the emergency repair operation in one of the process units of this refinery, five people were injured, and one of the injured died on Monday," an official from Bandar Abbas refinery told state media.

The Bandar Abbas oil refinery project was launched in 1992 and became operational in 1997. It is currently operating under the name of Bandar Abbas Oil Refining Company.

The nominal capacity of the facility is 350,000 barrels of crude oil and gas condensates per day, which accounts for 18% of Iran's petroleum products.

A similar incident happened in July in an oil facility in Bandar Abbas. Three petroleum product reservoirs belonging to the Aftab Oil Refining company caught fire with unspecified degree of damage.

Numerous unexplained explosions and fires have occurred at various Iranian military, nuclear, and industrial facilities, including pipelines and refineries, since mid-2020.

On January 28, a huge fire erupted at an Iranian military industry factory following a suspected drone strike in Esfahan.

Although authorities have not provided full explanations for the incidents, they have attributed a series of high-profile sabotage attacks on facilities to Israel. It's worth noting that Israel has not claimed responsibility for any of these events.